Page 6 of Blood Beneath the Snow

I nodded, feeling slightly ridiculous. “Yes. He wore the mask all the soldiers talk about—the one carved to look like a wolf’s skull.”

They were quiet for a few heartbeats before my best friend spoke up again. “Anyone can wear a mask, Revna,” she said softly. “And besides, if the Hellbringer were here, the war front would be, too. Maybe it was someone trying to scare you. He would have used his godtouch to kill you instantly if it were really him.”

I mulled it over. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had triedto take advantage of me with a scare tactic, but it was the first time anyone had bothered to disguise themselves as the culprit. The feeling of his hidden gaze following me as I walked the streets remained, and I pulled my shoulders back as if it would help.

“Maybe,” I conceded. “But you’re right. The whole city would be corpses in the streets if it really were him.”

The Hellbringer was known for his terrifying godtouch—the ability to kill anyone in sight with no more than a flick of his finger. He’d single-handedly turned the tide of the war in Kryllian’s favor. My father had been trying to capture him for almost seven years, to no avail. The general was a difficult man to find.

No one knew his true identity, despite his powerful magic. I thought again of the dark, blank eyes of the carved mask staring at me from the street. They’d bored into me, looking into the depths of my soul.

Halvar spoke up. “They’re saying he’s Aloisa-touched. That he might be Callum reincarnated.” He used his knife to clean the dirt from underneath his nails, nonchalant as ever.

I raised an eyebrow. Callum, the original Silencer. Legend had it he could take a person’s godtouch. Stop their ability to use magic with nothing more than a snap of his fingers. I didn’t put much stock in the stories, but the godtouched spoke of him in hushed, fearful voices when his name came up in temple worship or speeches by the priests. They told their children stories of Callum when they misbehaved.

While all the pantheon blessed the godtouched with gifts and supernatural abilities, Aloisa, the goddess of the soul, had never given a human any gift. Callum was the exception. A godtouch was innate, part of a person’s soul. Only her blessing could offer such a powerful ability.

Callum and his wife, Arraya, were also the first to claim theyspoke to the gods. They had believed themselves superior to the godforsaken—to the extent that they’d coined the terms in the first place. They created the Holy Order of Priests and attempted to take over the Fjordlands. Only swift opposition from two rebel groups, now our neighboring countries, kept them from succeeding.

They’d been killed in the war soon after the Fjordlands were split into three. Only their demise had allowed an unsteady peace to reign.

“I haven’t heard that,” I said, unable to suppress a frown.

Halvar gave me a sympathetic look. “You haven’t heard about it because you don’t run in the lowest of the godforsaken circles. Not like we do.” He gestured to himself and Freja.

I nodded, acquiescing with a frown. He was right. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t escape my family’s influence, which meant none of the godforsaken truly trusted me with any confidential information. “If he’s Callum reincarnate, does that make Kryllian the rightful country to rule the Fjordlands?”

Freja looked thoughtful, the light flickering over her dark skin as she leaned back against the wall, still cradling the newborn. “Probably depends on who you ask. I’m sure there are others like us who believe the whole story is hogwash. Then there’s the group who believe we’re the ones who rightfully own the land—Callum’s worthiest ancestors.”

“Meaning all of the godtouched in Bhorglid,” I said.

She nodded. “And then there have to be some godforsaken who wonder if this means the priests have it wrong. Who wonder if maybe Kryllian is supposed to rule it all.”

I sighed and rubbed a hand over my forehead. The priests would undoubtedly twist the rumors to their advantage as soon as they could manage. My chest constricted at the thought of the godforsaken who believed everything the religious leaders taught. Many—like Freja,Halvar, and me—kept up with the façade of corrupt religion only to prevent drawing undue attention. But plenty of others truly believed they were lesser than their godtouched peers.

Halvar hummed, his brow furrowed. “Regardless, the three of us know the truth: Callum was just a man in history who had an incredible ability that he used to persecute those with less power than him. And now, society looks like this.” He gestured to the rest of the basement, where we hid with an infant born to godforsaken parents. If anything spoke to the cruelty of our world today, it was this. “The greedy godtouched bastards never feel like it’s enough, so they keep warring and warring and warring until one day someone wins for a time. And then it starts all over again.”

It was easy to hear the frustration in his voice. I placed a gentle hand on his knee and he sighed. “Sorry. I get fed up with it is all.”

“I know.” Not for the first time, my heart ached, wishing I could do more for Halvar and Freja. And if the rest of the godforsaken benefited, that wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen.

He turned to meet my eyes with a half smile. “If we had a godforsaken queen, this wouldn’t be an issue.”

I moved my hand back to my lap and sighed. “It’s not possible. They’d never let me compete; you know that. And if they did, I wouldn’t win. Not against four men with incredibly powerful godtouches.”

“And even if she did win, the nearest priest would shoot her dead before she made her first move as queen,” Freja pointed out.

“Disrupting the rituals will have to be enough for our little rebellion.” I stood and stretched. “Regardless, you’re all right. There’s no way the Hellbringer is in the city. Whoever it was must have been playing a nasty trick.”

“Exactly,” Freja said. I watched her shoulders relax slightly. Had she been afraid? “Headed back home?”

“Yes. I’m late to meet Arne. He’ll kick my ass in training if I don’t get there soon.”

“And I’ll see you back here tonight, you hear?” Halvar ordered.

I grinned as I began to ascend the ladder leading to the trapdoor in the ceiling. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

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